All for One: Hero Legacy
by GKinni
Summary: Izuku was a Quirkless boy with dreams of being a hero. But he finally gets a chance to follow his dreams when the greatest hero in the world, Archetype, offers to pass on his own power to him, All for One. But Izuku will have to work hard in order to show the true worth of that ability, in his journey to become the new greatest hero.
1. A Test

"You can be a hero!"

The worth that those words had for the young Izuku Midoriya was immeasurable, specially considering that they had been said by his idol, the greatest hero in the world, Archetype.

Izuku had never imagined that his action of trying to save Bakugou from a villain would attract the attention of such an amazing figure. But things had happened like that, and Izuku could now see hope of being able to achieve his dreams.

Archetype (or "Takeshi Takato", which was apparently his real name) had told Izuku that they would talk more about that on the following day, and since it would be a Sunday, there would be more than enough time for them to hash out everything.

Izuku thought that he would have been unable to sleep due to the expectations, but it seemed that all the excitement of the day had tired him more than expected, and he fell asleep almost immediately after going to bed.

The next day, after waking up, he almost thought that it had all been a dream, so he took out his hero notebook and looked at the most recent page, where Archetype had written a particular place and time where they would meet up (a cafe in the city, at 10:30 AM).

Having convinced himself that it hadn't been a dream, Izuku could hardly contain his excitement during breakfast, wondering how exactly Archetype was planning on helping him become a hero. His mother noticed his attitude but didn't question it, simply being happy that he seemed to be more upbeat.

After breakfast, Izuku prepared his backpack with a lunch, money and his trusty hero notebook, and left his house after telling his mother that he might be away for the whole day.

He took the bus and got where he had to go one whole hour early, so he didn't actually go inside the cafe, but wandered around the proximity, taking note of the nearby places. And when it got to 10:00 AM, Izuku went back into the cafe and sat at a table to enjoy a cup of coffee with milk.

Time seemed to be moving very slowly, so Izuku busied himself by rereading the most recent entries in his hero notebook and trying to think of something else he could add, some new insight that could help even more in his struggle to be a hero, now that the opportunity had reignited his will.

Eventually though, the appointed hour came, and Takeshi walked through the door. And it was definitely Takeshi this time, instead of Archetype, which was understandable, considering the uproar that would be caused by the arrival of such a famous hero at a public place.

Izuku had been surprised once Archetype revealed his true appearance to him. Instead of the tall and muscular titan that he appeared as while in battle, Takeshi was a short, skinny man with a face that wouldn't stand out in a crowd.

Takeshi sat down on a chair in front of Izuku, on the same table. The boy opened his mouth to talk, but the man stopped him with a raised hand. Izuku waited, and felt something like a pulse of energy going through the air.

"There." Takeshi said "Now we can talk without the risk of anyone overhearing."

"Right." Izuku said, a little embarrassed for not having thought of that "Then..." He hesitated for a moment "What do I need to do to become a hero?"

Takeshi smiled "As long as you kept your heroic soul and your analytical mind, you would eventually become a hero even without my help." Then his expression became serious "What I am offering you is something far more serious. I am offering you the chance to become my successor."

Izuku's brain shut down. His mouth opened and closed a bunch of times, and Takeshi waited silently until the boy finally reacted. That reaction was:

"WHAT?!"

It was pretty smart of Takeshi to have already blocked the sound.

-0-

It took a while for Izuku to calm down. He muttered furiously, tried and failed to get a coherent sentence multiple times, fidgeted hard enough to qualify as a minor earthquake and a bunch of other stuff.

Eventually thought, he managed to get himself under control "How could I become your successor? I am Quirkless. Even becoming a hero at all would be difficult, so how could I take the place of the greatest hero in the world?"

Takeshi didn't smile, he simply spoke calmly "There are many heroes without Quirks, but that's not really the point, because I can give you a Quirk. Mine, in fact."

And then the previous scene repeated itself.

-0-

It took slightly longer for Izuku to recover that time, but Takeshi still waited patiently. And finally Izuku managed to get out a complete sentence:

"I couldn't... You are far too important to lose your powers, and I'm not worthy of getting so much power." Izuku said, even though it hurt him to speak that.

"There are two things wrong with what you said." Takeshi explained "The first is that I'm not going to lose my powers by giving you my Quirk. The nature of my abilities is different from what most people think. You must know of the theories about my power, right?"

Izuku took a deep breath and started speaking with ease "Considering the sheer versatility of your ability, the most plausible theory is some sort of extremely precise telekinesis coupled with a heightened perception, which allows you to manipulate the environment to produce different effects." He stopped to breath "Other theories involve similar things, like versatile transmutations of the environment or the ability to manipulate energy."

Takeshi nodded "That's pretty thorough, but the truth is even stranger than that. Technically you could call it 'manipulating waves', but that is only half of the equation. My true ability allows me to learn from witnessing other Quirks at close range, allowing me to affect the world in similar ways through the manipulation of waves. It is the Quirk that takes everything the user saw and learned and turns it into their strength. It is called All for One."

Izuku was speechless. The sheer magnitude of what he had just heard... He now knew an amazing secret from the greatest hero in the world, and he didn't know how to respond. Thankfully, Takeshi kept going.

"As such, even after handing the Quirk to you, I'll still retain all of the abilities that I acquired over my life, and you will have to develop your own set of skills. As for not being worthy of it..." His eyes softened "As I already said, you have the heart of a hero, and your mind is sharp. You are the person I chose to be my successor, so have a little more faith in yourself."

Izuku still couldn't respond, and Takeshi grinned and spoke again:

"But if you're still reluctant... How about we have a little test to see whether or not you are worthy of inheriting this power."

"A test?" Izuku managed to ask.

"Exactly. But first you have to decide." Takeshi became serious again "You want to become a hero, right? That means you must take responsibility for your own decisions. Will you accept to become my successor or will you try to go on a different path? Only you can make that decision."

There was a moment of hesitation, but then Izuku answered "I'll do it. I don't know if I'll be able to, but I'll do my best to become a hero worthy of you."

"That's what I wanted to hear." Takeshi smiled "Now, about the test I mentioned... Come with me."

He stood up to leave the cafe, and Izuku followed.

-0-

The place where Takeshi brought Izuku was an empty beach, which was isolated from the rest of the coast by some sharp rock hills on both sides. They had to get there via boat, and Takeshi said that it was a private beach that he owned.

"What do I need to do?" Izuku asked.

"Not much." Takeshi said, then he shifted, turning into the form of Archetype "Just defeat this guy."

And Archetype raised a hand and caused the sand in the entire beach to start trembling. Izuku watched in awe as a huge amount of sand coalesced into a sort of humanoid figure.

It was only sort of humanoid, because it didn't have a head, and the arms and legs were short and stubby, while most of its mass was in a rounded torso that was shaped sort of like a boulder.

The sand golem put one feet forward and advanced towards Izuku with quick steps, and the boy took a moment to realize that he was supposed to fight that, before jumping out of the way when the construct almost crashed into him.

"What?" He muttered, as the construct turned to face him again.

For a moment, panic gripped Izuku's heart at the thought of having to fight something like that when he didn't even have a Quirk, but then his eyes fell over the figure of Archetype, who was watching him with arms folded, and the boy realized that he was much more afraid of disappointing his expectations than he was of fighting and being hurt.

His mind snapped back into focus, and Izuku started analyzing every single aspect of the opponent and the environment, looking for anything that could be used as an advantage for him.

The sand golem advanced at him again, and this time Izuku realized that, while it managed to move pretty fast, the way the construct was built meant that it took a bit of time to gain speed, and it wasn't capable of turning very well.

Deciding to test a theory, Izuku prepared himself for another jump, while he kept looking at the opponent.

At the last second, he jumped to avoid a swipe of the thing's arm, and managed to confirm his suspicions. The arms of that construct were too short, so it would have to "bend down" in order to reach Izuku if he was crouching. And the boy had no doubt that this weakness had been deliberately put there by Archetype.

With this detail in mind, Izuku took into account the movement pattern of the enemy and the state of the surroundings to come up with a plan.

Again and again the construct advanced towards him, and Izuku dodged it, little by little luring the thing closer to the water. Also, he took off his backpack and held it in his hand.

He timed things out so that the next wave was about to arrive at the same time as the golem was reaching his position next to the water. Izuku waited until the last possible instant, knowing that this was the only way to make it work.

And when the sand construct swung its arm, Izuku moved.

He threw himself on the ground at the same time as he swung his backpack at the right leg of the enemy.

Izuku felt the arm of the golem passing right over him, and his hit caused the leg to crumble, making the construct collapse forwards, straight into the water.

But it wasn't very deep, so Izuku's plan needed to have one more step. He stood up again and pushed the golem forward with all his strength, making it slide deeper and deeper into the water.

Izuku only stopped when the water reached his waist, and he moved backwards, keeping an eye to see if the golem construct would be able to recover from that situation.

He didn't need to worry about that. The construct struggled, but it wasn't designed to swim, and the water soaked into its sand, making it heavier and heavier, until eventually it broke into pieces.

Izuku got out of the water, and looked at Archetype, who had a satisfied smile on his face.

"I think this should put to rest any doubts as to whether you are worthy of it or not. And in any case, you just need to always strive to improve yourself, and that is enough to satisfy All for One." Archetype went back to his Takeshi form "At least, that's what the previous holder told me."

Izuku's eyes widened "There was a previous holder?"

Takeshi nodded "Yes. Otherwise, how would I know that this power could be passed down?"

"That makes sense..." Izuku looked down in thought "How many holders have there been?"

"I am the eighth." Takeshi said.

Then he pointed a finger at Izuku, making his clothes dry in a few seconds.

"How about we go back to the cafe, and then we talk about how this will work?" He said.

-0-

They went back to the same place they had been before, even sitting at the same table. And Takeshi did his anti-snooping thing again.

"I'm sure you know what the best way for you to become a hero is." Takeshi said.

Izuku got confused for a moment, but then it clicked "You mean going to the International Hero School, right?"

"Yes." Takeshi said "Not every one of the great heroes started by going to that school, but it is definitely the best way to improve oneself quickly."

"I heard that the qualification process is extremely demanding." Izuku said "Even Kacchan wasn't completely confident about passing it." His eyes widened "The next opportunity to do it will be in ten months. Do you think it's enough time?" Izuku panicked a little bit.

"Yes." Takeshi nodded firmly "It will be enough time, because I have the perfect training program in mind." He grinned, and for some reason, Izuku felt a bit uneasy.

"And what will be that training program?" He asked.

"The first month will be preparing you physically and mentally without having the power." Takeshi started "You will have to train your body to get into shape, just as much as you did with your mind." He paused "I will also teach you some of the basic mechanisms behind powers, so that it will be easier for you to use All for One." He smiled a bit "You should be happy, since the first few holders of this power had to do it blindly, but recently there's been more and more superpowers research, and I also found out a few things."

Izuku was stunned. He knew that the powers theory stuff that was taught at school was very basic and missing quite a few things, with the teachers saying that the more complex stuff was college level. So the notion of receiving instruction about it from Archetype himself was something that he was barely able to conceive.

Takeshi kept talking "After that first month, you will receive the power of All for One, and will start developing your own skills based on the Quirks you are able to witness, specially those of your classmates." He waved his finger "You're not gonna be able to get a lot, but that is exactly what I intend. It's better for you to master a few techniques instead of trying to learn a ton of things you won't be able to use well." He smiled "I'll also help you in mastering those techniques."

Izuku nodded in understanding.

"And from that, the rest is self explanatory." Takeshi said "You'll keep training your body and your techniques, as well as learning some useful knowledge about heroing that will help you pass through the qualification process... And of course, you will also have to study in order to pass the academic requirements as well."

"Right. I understand." Izuku said "So will we start tomorrow after class?"

"Yes." Takeshi nodded "And you better be prepared, because this training program will push you to your limits."

Izuku swallowed and nodded. But he had already made up his mind, so what was left was just to do it.


	2. Powers Theory

After school, Izuku met up with Takeshi in the same place as always, and after their greetings, the superhero decided to start by asking Izuku a question:

"You know how some people have very dangerous Quirks, and yet it is very rare for them to hurt themselves by using them? Did you even think about why this is?"

Izuku thought about Bakugou and his explosions, and nodded "Yes, but I've never found anything close to an answer."

Takeshi nodded "It's understandable, because even I couldn't claim to understand that perfectly." He sighed "Even though it's one of the most studied subjects in the whole of power theory. But well..." He looked at Izuku "I understand enough to help teach you. Basically, you could say that at all times, Quirks are being subjected to two different influences, one internal and one external."

Izuku nodded, fascinated.

"The internal influence is clear. It is the will of the user. The same force that allows the user to be able to control their own Quirk, even things that don't have any visible physical means of control." Takeshi sighed "The external influence is something a lot more complicated. You can call it collective unconscious if you like, but that is not quite right. Essentially, it's a mysterious influence that acts upon all quirks to prevent them from 'breaking the rules'."

Izuku was confused, so Takeshi kept talking.

"For example: There is a hero who can create black holes. But they don't really act like actual black holes should act, and instead act more as some sort of suction and annihilation mechanism. This happens through a complicated process, as if there's something that takes the 'idea' of a Quirk and 'translates' it into something that fits while preventing it from causing too much havoc." Takeshi said "There are lots of Quirks that, in theory, could easily cause irreparable damage to the world. But in practice, none of them are capable of doing that, because of the restraints of that external force."

Izuku's mouth was open. This was something that made sense, but also led to countless other questions. What was that influence and what governed it? Takeshi had said something about the "collective unconscious", which was a good theory (most people in the world wouldn't like it if a Quirk randomly destroyed the earth, after all) but he also said it wasn't quite right.

The man saw that Izuku was thinking hard, and shook his head "You don't need to decipher everything all at once. Just be aware of that special influence for now. The other influence is far more important for you to think about right now."

"The individual influence, right?" Izuku said.

"Exactly." Takeshi said "That one actually involves something you should know about. What can you tell me about the Invisible Quirk Effect theory?"

Izuku thought a bit before talking "It's about how Quirk users, specially strong ones, are more resilient and recover faster than normal people, even when their Quirks have nothing to do with it."

"That's a pretty good summation." Takeshi nodded "But this theory is very flawed, if you know the right information." He clapped his hands together "Let's talk about the dawn of Quirks, where things were chaotic and confusing. A lot of research was done on the new Quirk users, and their tendency to be more durable than normal was noted even back then. There were lots of theories about it, of course. But do you know what was the most important part of those early researches?"

"What?" Izuku asked.

"The control groups." Takeshi said "By which I mean the Quirkless people. Their test results told us what being an "average human" meant. And more research of the type was done over time, and while it was so subtle most people missed it or thought it was a coincidence, after a certain period of time it became certain. It turned out that the Quirkless people were slowly becoming tougher on average, to the point where a normal person in today's world would be considered superhuman back at the dawn of Quirks."

"Seriously?" Izuku found it hard to believe.

"Yeah." Takeshi said "Now, this is partially speculation, but I believe it holds up due to how well it fits with other pieces of the puzzle that is Quirks. You know that despite frequently having biological explanations, Quirks as we know them wouldn't work if they were a purely biological phenomenon, right?"

"Ah, yes." Izuku said "The Unknown Energy Speculation, right?" He said the name of the theory he learned in school.

"Exactly." Takeshi nodded "Quirk users can access some external source of energy in some fashion, regardless whether it is an extra-dimensional phenomenon, some mental thing like the collective unconscious I mentioned before, or even something like the soul... It is definitely there, and the age of Quirks must have begun when the humans were granted access to that source. And that leads me to my theory."

Izuku paid extra attention

"What if everyone could access that external energy, not just people with Quirks?" Takeshi asked "What if the sudden accessibility of that energy was the thing that actually started the age of Quirks? That would explain a lot of things, wouldn't it?"

Izuku kept listening, fascinated.

"What if Quirks simply make it easier for the user to access that energy, and that's why people with Quirks would be naturally stronger, since they would toughen themselves up subconsciously? What if seeing people with Quirks that are tougher even if their Quirks don't involve that made Quirkless people subconsciously access that same energy and toughen themselves up due to believing that was just normal?" Takeshi looked incredibly excited to be talking about it, but then he sighed.

"Like I said, a lot of that is speculation so you shouldn't just take what I'm saying as gospel." He spoke carefully "Still, it would certainly explain a lot of things, including the many reports throughout history about quirkless heroes accomplishing superhuman feats."

Izuku nodded.

"The most important part of that in regards to you is that you must be aware of that energy, because you will need to manipulate it at a very precise level if you want to be able to develop strong skills." Takeshi concluded "Now, the next really big secret that you must keep in mind is the following: Every single Quirk works by either manipulating particles, or waves. Never both at once."

Izuku started to nod, but then he realized something "Is that really true? It doesn't seem right."

"Yes, it is." Takeshi said "That's one of things I am the most certain about, given how All for One works. A lot of Quirks do things like manipulate particles to generate waves, or release waves to manipulate particles, so they can affect both, but the origin of the effects is either one thing or the other."

"But what about Quirks involving light?" Izuku asked "Light is both a wave and a particle, right?"

"That's a very good question." Takeshi praised "The short answer is that both apply separately. Some quirks interact with light as if it were a particle, while others do it as if it were a wave." He raised a finger "However, there is a lot of research being done on light based quirks, because they borderline break the rules of the system." Takeshi seemed to struggle to find the right words "Basically, even though the rules of limited manipulation still apply to light based quirks, there are some phenomenons caused by them that can't be reasonably explained with that."

"Right... So the world of Quirks is really complex, isn't it?" Izuku said.

"Indeed." Takeshi said "Do you have any other questions?"

Izuku thought for a moment "You said All for One works by manipulating particles, right? Then does that mean that I'll only be able to imitate Quirks that are based on waves?"

"Surprisingly no." Takeshi said "All for One works based on results instead of causes. Like I said, that are many particle based abilities that end up manipulating waves, and while you can't imitate the origin of the ability, you can still imitate the manipulating waves part of it." He stopped for a moment "From my experience, most abilities have at least one aspect that you should be able to copy, so don't worry about it."

"Understood... Then, I guess I can't think of anything else to ask right now." Izuku said.

"In that case..." Takeshi grinned "It's time for us to deal with the matter of your physical training."

Izuku gulped.

+0+

And then Takeshi brought Izuku to... a fitness center.

The boy felt a faint sense of disappointment for some reason.

The two got in and Takeshi spoke with the people in the front desk for just a bit before they were allowed to enter and go into a specific room, where the person Takeshi had requested was waiting.

She was a woman whose very appearance screamed "personal trainer", with short black hair and a body with well defined muscles. She introduced herself as Haruka Atami, and Izuku felt shy due to how attractive she was.

"So he is the one you want me to train?" She asked Takeshi.

"That's right." Was his answer.

"What's the goal here? You mentioned a ten-month training program, so that means you must have an objective instead of simply getting this boy in shape." Haruka said.

"It's simple. During this ten months, the goal is to train him to the standard of an Olympic athlete." Takeshi explained.

"Are you serious about that?" Haruka asked, incredulous "That would be an extremely tough and demanding training schedule."

"Yes, I am serious." Takeshi confirmed "Izuku here is not going to give up, and he will complete whatever training menu you have for him."

"Oh, really... If that's the case, I think it would be interesting to do something like that. How much free time he has?"

And the two started getting into details as Izuku felt like Takeshi was throwing him to the wolves. He swallowed his worry, knowing that the path to becoming a superhero would be very tough.


	3. Inheritance

Izuku had not been wrong about how tough things would be. Haruka had set for him a comprehensive training schedule, where he would expend a lot of time in the fitness center under her watchful eye, while also doing rigid self-training while he was at home or in school.

And the training she did was truly comprehensive. Izuku was constantly assailed by throbbing all over his body, even in places he was previously unaware of, and that was a constant through the whole month.

Haruka seemed to have the eyes of an eagle (not her quirk, since it was heating up her hands to amazing temperatures), because every time he was getting close to getting used to the current level of training, she increased the intensity, keeping him constantly struggling to catch up.

More than once, he caught himself thinking of slacking on his individual training. However, every time the thought came to him, Izuku remembered Takeshi saying that he would not give up. He simply couldn't disappoint his idol and teacher.

And so Izuku persevered, and the first month of his accelerated training was over in a flash of pain and effort. The boy completely lost track of the time, so he only realized what was going on after Archetype brought him to the same isolated beach in which he had been tested.

+0+

"Are you ready?" The hero asked.

Izuku hesitated for a moment "Has it really already been a month...?" He muttered, before shaking his head and looking at Archetype "I'm ready."

The hero nodded and walked close to Izuku before laying a hand at his head.

There was a moment of silence, as Izuku waited and prepared himself for what would happen.

Then Archetype removed his hand and Izuku opened his eyes in confusion "What happened?" He asked.

"It's done." Archetype said with a smile.

"Really?" Izuku was surprised "I didn't feel anything."

"That's normal. You can't feel the powers of the previous holder, so you should only notice something unusual when you get close to other quirk users."

Izuku was about to say something, but then he thought about it for a moment.

"So that's why you didn't say anything about me copying your powers." He concluded.

"Yes." The other nodded "I'm not entirely sure, but I think this is a kind of safety measure. Considering how many abilities I've cultivated, having a new holder of One for All being able to sense all of them as soon as they got the power would be too overwhelming."

"That makes sense as well." Izuku nodded.

+0+

And Izuku soon realized what his mentor had meant. While he was walking down the street after receiving the power, just walking close to some people (probably those that had "always on" quirks that involved waves) was enough to confuse him with the strange new feelings that he was getting from All for One.

He knew that he could probably already start trying to replicate those vibrations (that was the only way he could describe what he was feeling) but Takeshi had advised him against it, and Izuku understood why. He could barely make out the general shape of those vibrations, so it would be dangerous if he replicated them wrongly causing unexpected effects.

Instead, he just tried to get used to his new senses, tried to understand more details about those vibrations, and tried to differentiate between different types. It was his first day with a quirk and Izuku already had a ton of new things to learn.

And when he returned home, Izuku remembered that he still had to keep up with his physical training.

+0+

Two more months passed, with Izuku splitting his time in between physical training and Quirk training.

On the former side, Haruka had started praising him, saying that Takeshi had been right when he said Izuku would never give up. Of course, this made her demands of him increase even more, as she was certain that he could handle it, leading Izuku to long for the days of his earlier training, which now seemed like paradise in comparison.

On the latter side, Izuku slowly sharpened his quirk senses and eventually started developing his own abilities. And perhaps it should not be surprising, but his greatest inspiration in that endeavor was his friend, Bakugou Katsuki.

Takeshi had said that most quirks involved both particles and waves in some form, and Bakugou's own quirk was a perfect example of that. The theory was simple: His body naturally generated explosive sweat, which he could ignite with a produced spark. Both the sweat and the spark were particles.

This would make it seem there was nothing involving waves in Bakugou's quirk, but that wasn't the case. Bakugou's explosions generated shock waves, and while normal explosions would have shock waves that expanded equally in all directions, Bakugou was capable of manipulating them unconsciously so that some of the energy that was going in his direction would actually be reflected, and add to the power of the shock wave going forward. To a lesser extent, this also happened with the portions of the shock wave going to the sides, thus giving him a greater control over the results of his explosions.

His control wasn't perfect, but that meant that he had to endure much less strain from the close range explosions than it would seem. Izuku remembered their childhood, and came to the conclusion that this control had been achieved slowly over the course of Bakugou's life, with him using stronger and stronger explosions as time passed and his skills improved.

And that wasn't even the only thing. Bakugou was even capable of manipulating the waves he created by transforming them into kinetic energy, which allowed him even more control over the results of his explosions.

Izuku had spent quite a lot of the school time in those two months "playing" with Bakugou, which pretty much meant goading him into demonstrations of his power under the guise of practice for the qualification process.

After that momentous day, the relationship between the two had become strange. Bakugou seemed to be a lot angrier than usual, but in a restrained way, and avoided Izuku by throwing himself into studies and training. But the qualification process for the International Hero School was looming on the horizon, and Bakugou knew that he had to do whatever was necessary to be able to have a chance to pass, and his training with Izuku allowed him to learn quite a few new things, thanks to the analytical mind of the other boy.

And Izuku started trying to replicate the wave portion of Bakugou's powers. Takeshi approved of it, because it would be a very versatile ability once mastered. The hero also pointed out that eventually, Izuku could train it enough to be able to discriminate targets to an incredibly precise level, thus being able to use powerful abilities without the fear of harming innocents.

That thought really appealed to Izuku, so he practiced even harder to try and get a better handle on those skills, slowly reaching the point where he could use weak destructive and weak moving waves fairly reliably.

(Takeshi had joked that Izuku now had the ability to summon explosions from the explosion dimension and shoves from the shove dimension. The boy appreciated the comic book reference.)

And one day, while he was practicing those skills under Takeshi's watchful eyes, Izuku was struck by a sudden realization:

+0+

"How will I explain this?!" He almost shouted "Bakugou will also be at the Qualification Process, and he knows I don't have a quirk!"

Takeshi smiled, already used to Izuku's personality "No need to worry. I have already thought about that." A pause "Do you remember what I explained about triggered quirks?"

Izuku's calm returned as he remembered that lesson "Sometimes, when people without quirks go through extremely taxing experiences, they obtain abilities of their own. According to your theories, that's because they managed to connect deeper with the "energy source" due to the great amount of physical and mental stress they underwent." He recited, then blinked "You mean... We are going to pretend that's the case with me?" He looked at Takeshi.

"More than that. We are going to simulate one of those events, including the hospital stay, to the point where no one will be able to detect anything unusual about it." Takeshi grinned.

Izuku looked at that grin and got a bit worried.

+0+

The plan turned out to be fairly simple. Izuku would go to a deserted part of the city, a narrow road that could be used as a shortcut between Izuku's school and a hobby shop he frequented. While there, he would simulate being attacked by a villain (dropping his backpack, running and "stumbling", thus scratching his knee).

Archetype would have noticed the struggle, and thus arrive in time to save Izuku. The villain would manage to escape, because Archetype would have prioritized taking Izuku to the hospital.

And the reason why Izuku would have to go to the hospital would be blood loss, despite the lack of any visible injuries, because the quirk of the villain was some fort of blood absorption.

Of course, Archetype could fake it well enough, and knew how much blood to take from Izuku to ensure that he would stay in the hospital for enough time to sell the seriousness of the situation, and without truly risking his life. More than that, it was something that Izuku could recover from quickly and without leaving any sort of side effects.

That was the plan in its entirety. It was very simple, thus had very few things that could go wrong, which was the main point.

+0+

Of course, when it came time to actually execute the plan, it... worked perfectly.

Izuku was almost baffled by the fact that nothing had gone wrong. But Archetype's preparations (including checking the road with his powers to make sure it was empty) paid off, and Izuku was currently lying down on a hospital bed, trying to prepare himself for what would be the hardest thing he would have to do.

Talk to his mother.

Midoriya Inko had received a call earlier, and one of the nurses had just told Izuku that his mother had arrived.

"Izuku!" She burst into the room, tears in her eyes.

"Hi mom." Izuku said weakly.

"Are you okay, dear?" She approached, looking slightly less hysterical after having heard him talk.

"I'm fine." He raised his hand a little "I just feel really weak." He let it drop again and then smiled "Archetype saved me."

"Did he?" Inko asked, feeling better upon seeing his smile "I have to thank him, then."

"Ah, and mom... There's something I need to tell you." Izuku said in the most serious way he could, given how weak he was.

"What is it?" Inko approached Izuku and bent down to listen carefully.

Izuku raised a finger and caused his mother's bangs to move up as if there was wind.

"I got a quirk." He said.

Inko froze for a moment, and then the tears returned, only this time they were happy tears.

"Izuku!"


	4. Qualification Process Starts

Midoriya Izuku, 14 Years Old. Quirk: Vibration.

That was the information that was written in Izuku's file when he signed up for the qualifications to enter the International Hero School. It might have seen like too little, but that actually showed just how bitter a struggle Izuku would have to endure. There was no point in collecting so much information when most of the candidates would be eliminated right from the first stage.

The qualification would last for six whole months, and Midoriya would reach fifteen before it was over. And as long as he avoided elimination, more and more would be added to his file, serving somewhat like a curriculum.

Which meant that, after reaching a certain point in the qualifications, even the failed students would be highly sought after by all kinds of other academies, labs and training institutions, allowing them a leg up on their dreams and making it so that their months of effort weren't wasted.

That was another reason why so many youngsters signed up for the tests.

"Do your best." Were the words Izuku's mother said when he left on that critical day.

Those few words were all that really was needed, since the hug she gave him expressed her feelings in a very eloquent way.

The place, or rather places, for the first test were actually somewhat of a secret. Izuku only received directions on the very same day he had to leave, and after following those directions (which included taking two trains), Izuku was faced with a big bus which had dark windows.

He entered the bus by showing his registration card to the driver, who checked it with a scanner before waving Izuku in.

He sat near the back and next to the right window. Izuku saw that a few other teenagers were inside the bus, but none of them seemed to want to talk. Bakugou wasn't there, but that wasn't surprising. It would be strange if contestants from the same areas weren't separated.

The first phase of the qualification process would be held within fifty separate grounds all over Japan, so it wasn't like there was a lack of choice.

Three more people got inside the bus before it started moving. It was still not full, which made Izuku realize the real reason why the directions he had been given included a specific time window. It was because the bus would be stopped at that place only during that time.

The trip continued, with the bus stopping in certain places for twenty minutes and picking up more candidates. The bus started filling up fast, and before long someone else ended up sitting besides Izuku.

It was a short girl with an appearance somewhat reminiscent of a frog. She had long dark hair and wide eyes with pure black irises. Her mouth was wide and her hands were large.

"My name is Tsuyu Asui. I'm from the Aichi Prefecture." She introduced herself.

"My name is Izuku Midoriya. I'm from the Shizuoka Prefecture." He said.

Izuku wasn't really used to speaking with others, particularly girls, but that didn't seem to matter to Tsuyu, who easily got him involved in a light conversation about school, friends and their respective quirks. In regards to the latter...

"Your quirk is really cool." Izuku said honestly.

Tsuyu's frog form gave her enhanced physical abilities, a powerful and mobile long tongue, as well as a bunch of smaller things. It was not an overly flashy power, but it was well-rounded, easy to use and had quite a few obvious paths for growth.

"You quirk is also pretty cool, though I don't understand how half of those things you talked about have anything to do with vibration." Tsuyu said.

"To be honest, neither do I, but vibration is how I understand it, so... I guess it works?" Izuku half-lied.

He was happy to have someone like Tsuyu to talk to during the trip to the place of the first test. He managed to mostly forget his worries and was able to relax. And eventually, the bus reached its final stop.

When Izuku got out from the transport, he was incredibly surprised. They had somehow gone underground, and the place they were at actually contained an entire city block (probably a replica created for the test).

The group followed a series of signs and finally congregated in a specially demarcated area, just a little bit inside the city. Izuku looked around and saw that there were other groups in different places, and presumably quite a few that he couldn't see.

"Looks like there's going to be as lot of people on this test, ribbit." Tsuyu said.

"Yeah, and it makes sense, considering how big this place is." Izuku agreed.

He was thinking about what kind of test it could be, when the answer came in the form of a computerized voice that came from hidden speakers across the entire city block.

"Attention, contestants. The countdown to the beginning of the test will start in a minute. Before that, I shall explain what you shall be doing in this test." The voice stopped for a moment "This city block is the testing field. Inside you will find different situations which will force you to exercise your heroic abilities and judgment.

"Situations such as robotic 'villains' causing havoc and plastic 'civilians' in dangerous places. You will earn points based on how you deal with those and other, more complex, situations. Those that reach a certain number of points within fifteen minutes will be qualified for the next phase of tests.

"One thing to keep in mind. While it is essentially impossible for all, or even most of you to obtain enough points to get through this initial phase, it is very possible for none of you to reach this standard. Keep this in mind: Only the best will be allowed to proceed forward."

With that, the voice went silent, and soon after, it was replaced by a countdown starting from twenty.

'So that's how it is...' Izuku thought, and then he had an idea and turned to talk to Tsuyu:

"Do you want to team up for this?" He asked.

"Hm?" She turned to him.

"Well, it's fine if you don't want to!" He said hastily, freaking out slightly.

"No, I think that's a good idea too." Tsuyu's face didn't show any expression, but her voice seemed amused "How do you think we should start?"

"Going up." Izuku said.

Tsuyu nodded, understand the intention of getting a view from above. The countdown kept going, and as soon as it hit zero, Tsuyu leaped towards one of the nearby buildings. At the same time, Izuku pointed a hand at the top of said building and shot upwards.

That particular maneuver was actually something he had his mother to thank for. He had gotten interested in her quirk when he noticed one time where she used it to grab a bottle of ketchup without even looking at it. His mom had explained by saying that she could more or less sense the surrounding environment, though mostly because it was her house and she understood it.

Takeshi had said that sensorial abilities were one of the most essential tools he should try to develop, so Izuku started to investigate how Inko's quirk worked. And soon he noticed that this sensorial part wasn't the only interesting part of that ability.

Essentially, "pull small objects" was something of a misnomer. Inko's quirk should be classified as "pull objects based on mass difference between it and the user". It had a lot in common with gravity, since it was based on respective masses.

However, it also had some characteristics of magnetism, because Inko could use it on objects that had a bigger mass than her, but the result would be that she was the one who would be "pulled" in the direction of the object.

Of course, even pulling objects whose mass exceeded one thirtieth of hers already caused a big burden on her body, which was why Inko had never noticed the real way her quirk worked. However, this quirk could be developed in that direction, such as learning to reduce the burden to be able to pull bigger masses, as well as the trick Izuku was currently doing: By distributing the force of the pull throughout his entire body, instead of just through his arm, he was able to pull himself towards things as a way to get around quickly.

Of course, he had almost broken his arm while he was learning to do that, but it was worth it.

Izuku zoomed upwards, and he was only slightly slower than Tsuyu, who had leaped at the wall of the building and then jumped upwards the rest of the way. Izuku also focused to try and sense the general state of the surrounding environment (he hadn't managed to truly hone the sensory capabilities of the skill to a decent level, but it was still something).

And with that, he was able to feel when all hell broke loose. The previously quiet buildings and streets became a sudden pandemonium.

Izuku could not get any details from the skill, but it wasn't entirely needed, as he could see a lot just from using his eyes. Robots had crawled out of the "sewers", exploded out from buildings or dropped down from the air. Fires broke out, buildings had partial collapses and a flood started. And the "civilians', red and white plastic models were teleported in, some appeared hanging from buildings, others on rooftops and others on the streets or inside buildings, and they were all somehow in danger.

He looked at Tsuyu, who had noticed it too. She looked at him for a moment and spoke three words:

"Left side first."

He nodded. The city block for the test consisted of three streets and the accompanying buildings. The left street was closest to the building they were on top of, so it would make sense to start from it.

Both of them jumped from the building. Tsuyu dove close to the wall and stopped herself a bit below the third floor mark. Just beside her was one of the hanging civilians, whom she put on her back before jumping towards the ground.

Izuku took a different approach. He used his "pull" power to "grab" onto the top of a nearby building and "swung" forward. His target was a robot that was rushing down the street in the direction of a trio of civilians.

Using a "shove", he neutralized the rest of the impact of landing and then sent an explosion straight at one of the legs of the robot (it was a biped). He targeted one of the joints, and the shock wave did exactly what it was supposed to do, breaking off the leg and causing the robot to topple to the ground. He sent another shock wave at the "head", managing to make the thing stop moving completely.

Then Izuku turned around and looked at the civilians. For a moment he thought of "rescuing" them, but he remembered that some of the models were lying on the ground, while those were upright, and so probably represented people who could move.

"Go to a safe place!" He shouted at them.

He felt pretty silly doing it, but it was important to show his train of thought, since the exam was being recorded.

At that moment, he saw Tsuyu leaping over him and into a nearby building with a floor on fire. She jumped back out of the building a few seconds later, carrying three civilian models, and landed right next to Izuku. He had an idea:

"Throw them there!" He pointed to a place outside the city block, presumably safe.

She hesitated for a moment, but decided to trust Izuku. She threw the plastic models into the distance, and he used the last of the major skills he had developed during the training period: The Air Cushion.

It was something he had originally developed as a defensive ability, based on the quirk of one of his classmates that allowed him to manipulate the air into a colorful cushion. He could only create it at touch-range, and the cushion he was capable of making was small, but Izuku managed to develop the main part of the ability (the color part was apparently based on particles), to the point where he could make a big cushion even far away from him.

And of course, if he needed a defense, he could make the close range cushion a lot thicker and more protective, but just for softening a landing, that would not be necessary.

Tsuyu nodded at him, and the two jumped into action again. The next few minutes were a blur as the duo teamed up to try and get the highest number of points possible. They rescued civilians from various places, destroyed robots of different designs and weapons, and tried to take note of the other candidates, who were showing off their own quirks as trying to get points as well.

And it was because of this last thing that Izuku noticed something. It was some kind of shadow tendril that extended from the inside of a building and hit a nearby participant in the head, knocking him out, before dragging him inside.

He made a gesture to get Tsuyu to notice him, and then spoke:

"There's something there." He pointed.

She looked like she was going to ask what it was, but then it happened again.

Her voice became serious "Looks like one of our competitors decided to try and sabotage the other participants."

"What?" Izuku could barely believe what he was hearing.

"Maybe we should..." She started talking, but then stopped suddenly, it seemed like she was thinking of something "Now I understand..."

"What?" Izuku asked.

"Saving people and defeating robots helps, but what if the examiners are looking for something else? What if we need to look for the source of the problems? A lot of the robots came from the underground, so maybe it is there." She deduced.

Izuku thought that it sounded likely "There's probably not just one 'source'. There's probably a few of them spread around." He added "But what about that one?" He pointed at the building.

"We should have enough time to deal with that before going." Tsuyu concluded.

Decision made, the two acted fast, since the test was timed. They got down from the building they were in and Izuku ran across the street, right next to the building of the enemy. He was focusing on his positional sense as he did so, and that was a good thing, because the black tendril was ridiculously silent and surprisingly fast. Izuku was barely able to put up a cushion shield in order to block it.

He immediately counter-attacked with a short-range shock wave upwards into the tendril, but it seemed to be unaffected. However, it did the job of attracting the attention of the owner, who retracted the tendril slightly in order to attack again.

But Izuku wasn't alone. Tsuyu had positioned herself in a blind spot before leaping straight into the building with great speed. Izuku saw from the tendril movement that the enemy had been startled, and tried to do a swipe at Tsuyu, but she did something and the tendril fell to the ground.

Izuku got in, and saw that the enemy had been a black haired girl. The black tendril was formed from her hair, abnormally compressed and threaded together. Tsuyu had apparently knocked the girl unconscious.

"Too bad." He said, looking at her "She would probably have a chance if she did the exam properly..."

"Yep, ribbit." Tsuyu agreed "But it's too late now."

They saw that there were eight unconscious participants lying down to the side. While Izuku felt pity for them, he also knew that they were probably going to fail.

Looking around, Tsuyu saw that there was a hole leading to the underground in a nearby room. Both she and Izuku went down it, and he was surprised to see that the sewer, while not exactly bright, definitely had enough illumination for them to be able to see their way around.

They walked together, quickly but carefully, trying to prepare themselves for anything that might happen.

However, it ended up not being necessary. They soon found a big and strange machine that was connected to the walls of the underground and apparently pushing some strange dark liquid into them. They didn't know exactly what it was, but it definitely wasn't good.

Still, one kick from Tsuyu and two fast shock waves by Izuku later, the machine was destroyed. The two ran out, hoping to go into another hole to see if there was more of those machines. However, before they could, the end of the test was announced.

+0+

Soon after that, in the control room, a question was asked:

"So, how many of the kids managed to pass the test?" The speaker was a middle aged woman with purple eyes and hair.

"Apparently, there were twenty-one." A male technician said in tones of surprise.

"Oh? That's double the usual amount. Looks like there are a lot of promising kids on this batch." The woman said.

A report was soon made. The contents of it were simple: Testing Location Number 17. Test Ended. 514 Participants. 21 Passing.

That was only the first test. The passing students would still have to do a lot more in order to be accepted at the International Hero School.


	5. The Meaning of the Testing Circuit

After the test was over, the participants who had managed to pass were announced one by one through the same computerized voice as before, and they were instructed to go to a certain part of the constructed city (the end of one of the streets) while the rest went back to the buses and was driven away.

Izuku looked around at the other passing candidates and thought about those whose quirks he had managed to witness during the test, hectic as it had been. There was a girl with violet hair and somewhat lizard-like elongated hands. Her quirk seemed to do with eating metal pieces and spitting the out in other forms, and she could also control the resulting constructs at a distance.

Izuku wondered how much of what she was doing was based on particles and how much on waves. The ability to reshape materials alone would be amazing, depending on what he could do with it. There was also a short boy with strawberry blonde hair who seemed to be able to create objects around himself, or perhaps he was simply transporting them from somewhere else. Either way, the mechanics of what he did should be interesting.

Lastly, there was a very tall (almost 2 meters) and lanky girl with bubblegum pink hair. Her power seemed to be one which revolved around outside things, since she had a huge back that she reached into every time she switched abilities. It was difficult to tell exactly what he could do, but Izuku had seen (and felt) things that seemed like sonic waves, blasts of "fire" (something similar to that, at least) and even a strange glass-like shield.

The versatility was very interesting, of course, but Izuku was more interested in how the object triggers worked, and whether he could make use of them in some manner... His contemplations were cut off when a purple haired woman appeared out of thin air and clapped her hands together for attention, completely cutting off what little conversation there had been before.

"My name is Hanafusa Toyomi. I'm the general manager of this particular exam site." She said "All of you already deserve congratulations, since you managed to pass the first round of examinations. This doesn't mean you can relax, however, as the next few phases of examination will get progressively harder, to the point where I wouldn't be surprised if no one here actually manages to reach the end."

There was a moment of silence, and then she smiled and spoke again:

"However, reaching this point is already proof that you have plenty of potential. Even if you guys fail in the next phase, you'll have no trouble finding good schools to take you in." She shook her head "However, that is something for later. Right now I am supposed to be explaining to you how the testing circuit works."

The students gave off an aura of excitement.

"The testing circuit consists of five rounds in total, with this one being the first." Hanafusa started to explain "From here, you'll be transported to a second testing location, joining together with the passing students of several other sites. There, you'll have a month of train and learn before the next test, where even more people will be weeded out.

"The passing students from that test will go to a third location, and that will repeat until the final test, where the best students of all Japan will take a final test to determine which of them will qualify for entering the International Hero School." She shook her head "I can't say anything about the training and tests you'll be undergoing on the next rounds, but I can say that the training period in the third site will be one month, and it will be two months on each of the last two sites. All that totals six months."

Izuku nodded. So that was how it was. He had wondered how that whole process of six months would work, but that was actually real good news for him. Izuku would have the opportunity to interact with and learn from the most talented quirk-users in Japan.

Hanafusa spoke with them more, explaining the details of accommodation, communication and transportation. Apparently, the passing candidates would be treated to a meal and allowed to rest before taking another bus to the second testing location, and they would receive further instructions there.

+0+

It went just like Hanafusa had said. The food the passing candidates were given wasn't exactly luxurious, but it was good and in great quantity, perfect for a group of teenagers who had just finished a particularly tiring (if short) test.

They took the chance to introduce themselves and their quirks, and Izuku made a few more mental notes about this new information, but when the meal was over, Izuku excused himself to ask to use one of the phones so that he could contact his mother.

He put in his house number, and the phone had barely started ringing when it was picked up.

"Izuku?!" It was his mother.

"It's me, mom. Everything is fine." He reassured her "I did it. I got past the first stage."

"Izuku..." He could tell that she was tearing up. He was the same way.

They spoke for quite a while on the phone. Izuku explained about the qualification process, and how he would contact her again once he reached the second testing site and understood how things worked there.

Eventually though, Izuku said his goodbyes and hanged up the phone. Just a short time after that, the bus for the passing candidates arrived.

+0+

Again, Izuku was sitting on a bus and being taken to a new place. But it was very different this time. Since all the candidates knew that they would be staying together for a certain period of time, there was no barrier for them to get to know each other. That meant the bus was lively with conversations all around.

The teenagers were talking about their favorite heroes, their methods of training, their ideas about support items... And whatever else came to mind. It was a very unusual feeling for Izuku, to be able to talk freely about his interests with people who shared them.

All that conversation made the time pass quicker, and soon the passengers became aware of the bus moving more slowly and eventually stopping. They were instructed to leave the bus, and upon doing so, found themselves inside a huge underground parking garage.

They saw seven other buses similar to theirs were already there, and a huge number of candidates had already left their transports and were congregating inside a marked circle, which had a few adults nearby, probably the managers for that particular stage of the testing circuit.

They hurried to stand on the same place, and when it was done, one of the managers took a step forward to address the gathered participants. He was a rather tall old man with a beak on his head and feathers on his arms.

"With this, all the participants for this location have been gathered." He started "Each and every single one of you can be considered a talent, worthy of having effort put into your development."

He looked at all of them as he spoke "However, for most of you, this effort will come from other training institutions. This is not a failure, but simply an admission that you will have to spend a longer time training before you're ready to enter into the world of the pros."

The mood was grim was they heard that, but the old man still kept going "Those qualified to enter the international hero school will be the ones capable of persevering through competition and pressure. Those who can become diamonds and break into the world of heroes earlier. They can lighten the burden of those who are protecting us day to day. This is the meaning of the testing circuit."

And those words caused the blood within the young people to boil. That sort of heavy responsibility was the greatest recognition they could wish for as heroes. It would be the greatest proof of being able to make a difference.

"I see you understand what I mean. Now, I guess I should introduce myself. My name is Tanaka Shiki, and I am the chief examiner of this testing site. Within one month, I shall decide which of you will be able to pass to the next phase." He looked left and right at the crowd "There are one hundred and fifty-seven candidates here, and I don't expect more than a tenth of you to achieve the right standards, but I'm always ready to be proven wrong." He stopped for a moment "Ah, and one last thing: The theme for this stage of the testing is Teamwork."


	6. Selection Starts

After Tanaka's speech, four of his apparent coworkers stepped forward and stood side to side before the one furthest to the left spoke:

"Students with surnames starting with the letters A to G, line up in front of me!"

And the other three spoke in turn, saying the same thing except with replacing the letters with "H to M", "N to T" and "U to Z".

"I guess we're gonna split for the moment." Tsuyu spoke "See you later, Midori."

"See you." He said, before heading towards his own line of people.

The procedure after that was simple, each of the supervisors asked for the names of the students in front, giving them large envelopes and sending them away. When Izuku received his, he discovered that it was indicated with his name.

He walked off a bit before opening the envelope, and found within a variety of papers. One of them was a map of the facilities, which clearly indicated where the dorm rooms, meal rooms and shower rooms were, along with the practice fields and exercise rooms.

Another was a schedule for meals, events and other activities. Yet another was a card which apparently served as the key to his dorm room (which would be shared with five other people). Those were the most important stuff, but there were also quite a few other odds and ends.

"This all seems pretty straightforward so far." Tsuyu spoke, having walked towards him once she got her own envelope.

"Yeah." Izuku agreed "But I'm pretty sure it's going to be more difficult than it's looking so far." He thought about what Takeshi had said in regards to the Testing Circuit.

+0+

"So, you want to know how the Testing works, huh..." Takeshi nodded "I can't give you any specifics, but what I can say is that it is not just a question of power and skill." He paused for a moment.

"They test mentality, such as the ability to handle pressure and how they deal with people. They test intelligence, such as decision making skills and observation capacity. They test students to their limits, to see which of them would rise up and shine as true diamonds." Takeshi spoke with a serious voice.

"So," He continued "The best advice I can give you would be to not let your guard down, and give it everything you have, always." He shook his head "I know this sounds like simple common sense, but actually doing it is a lot harder than most people think. You need to always be looking at yourself and wondering if there was something you could be doing better."

"Understood." Izuku nodded "I'll keep that in mind."

"I know you will." Takeshi smiled.

+0+

Izuku looked at the schedule, trying to see if there was something there he could use as a clue. And eventually, he thought he had found what he was looking for.

"That schedule only covers the first week." He noted "I'm pretty sure this is significant somehow."

"Hmm." Tsuyu nodded "Any idea what it could mean?" She asked.

"Maybe the following weeks will be similar activities, except they will be more and more demanding, and this first week will be all the time we have to get used to that and prepare for how things will become." Izuku said.

Tsuyu considered it "That seems plausible. Anyway, it doesn't change what we have to do here, right?"

"Right." Izuku nodded.

"Well, I'm gonna go check out my room and roommates, see you later, Midori." She waved her hand.

"Later." He replied.

And then both of them separated, each one going to their own rooms.

+0+

Izuku saw the first one of his roommates at the same time as he saw the 'Luggage Set' with his name that was placed next to the dorm room.

Since the candidates hadn't been allowed to bring long-term possessions with them when going to the first test, they would be provided with everything they would need for a long term stay at the testing facility. That was what was inside the 'Luggage Set'.

And the person he had seen was checking his own 'Luggage Set'. It was a red-haired boy with a muscular build. He hadn't seem Izuku yet.

"Hello..." Izuku greeted the other boy awkwardly as he walked closer.

Said boy turned and saw him "Ah, hello!" He spoke boisterously "You're also going to be living in this room?" Izuku noticed that he had a set of sharp teeth.

"Yes." Izuku answered "My name is Izuku Midoriya. Nice to meet you."

"Ah, I'm Eijirou Kirishima. Nice to meet you, man!" The boy grasped his hand in an enthusiastic shake "Looks like the other boys have already gone inside." He pointed out the lack of other 'Luggage Sets' around the door "But I wanted to have a look at my luggage first."

"Anything interesting?" Izuku asked, feeling more at ease, since the other boy seemed to be friendly.

"Nah, so far it all seen like pretty basic stuff." Kirishima shook his head "I'll tell you if I find anything interesting, though."

"Thanks." Izuku said "Well, I'm going inside to meet the others. See you soon."

"See you." Kirishima replied.

+0+

The meeting with the other roommates went similarly well, even though they were not as friendly as Kirishima. There was Rikido Satou, a tall and burly guy who mentioned that he had special access to the kitchens, since his quirk necessitated the consumption of food (sweets, to be exact).

Second was Hanta Sero, a smiling boy with a quirk that was obvious from looking at his altered elbows. Sero was remarkably talkative, and he mentioned that there was no one else from his bus staying at their room.

Third was Amata Kintarou a short boy with green hair that had an extra pair of arms and a quirk related to them. He said that he hadn't expected to be one of the ones selected to go to the next phase because he actually got pretty hurt during the test.

Fourth was Dougu Saiman, a boy with heavy bangs over his eyes and a thick fur coating over his limbs. Contrary to his appearance, he wasn't shy, instead having a loud and booming voice.

Kirishima got inside midway through that, and he proved to be just as friendly as he had appeared to be, quickly drawing the other five in an enthusiastic conversation about their favorite heroes.

Izuku's was Archetype, Kirishima liked the old-school hero Crimson Riot, Satou liked the famous international hero Aero Blast, Sero liked the rising star new hero Mixture, Kintarou's favorite was the retired super-heroine Core and Saiman was partial to the mysterious hero Edge.

Soon, however, the time arrived for the only activity they would have during the first day: The dinner. The group left their room in order to go to eat. Tsuyu caught Izuku's attention while on the way there and the two ended up in neighboring seats in the dining hall, speaking about their respective roommates.

Time seemed to fly. And soon enough Izuku was back to his dorm room and lying down to sleep.

+0+

The next day was much less easy going. It started with a very loud alarm ringing in their room and waking everyone up at six in the morning. From there, Izuku had to rush through his morning routines in order to be able to have enough time to get to Arena 1, which would be the place for his first activity.

According to the schedule, it would be "Doubles Training". Izuku quickly got inside the place, and saw that it was a huge room with thirty pool-like spaces with stairs leading down them. Each hole was around the same depth as the height of a normal room, and double the width.

Those should be battlefields. Beside each of them was an electronic sign on a pole, and Izuku could see several cameras in the border recording every battlefield.

Izuku didn't see anyone familiar nearby, but he didn't have to wait for long, as he had gotten there with barely two minutes to spare.

Among the materials Izuku had received was an explanation of every one of the events that the candidates would take part in. The section on Doubles Training had said "Candidates chosen must head down to the arena within thirty seconds and cooperate to achieve the stated objectives." which was fairly straightforward, but also pretty vague.

At exactly six and a half in the morning, the signs all lit up at the same time. Each of them had two names and a single line of text. It only took a few moments for Izuku to find his name, and in the time that took, something else appeared on the sign.

It was a countdown starting with thirty seconds.

Realizing what that meant with a shock, Izuku reached out with his mind and pulled himself towards the right arena, following it up by ignoring the stairs and simply jumping down and using the air cushion to land safely.

Only moments later, someone else landed near him. It was a girl, and a fairly cute one at that, to the point where Izuku would start stumbling over his words and making a fool of himself had he met her in a more casual occasion. However, the pressure of the situation prevented him from giving it much thought beyond remembering the name that had been next to his on the sign: Uraraka Ochako.

The two greeted each other quickly, seeing that time was of the essence. She told him that her quirk manipulated gravity, and he gave her a quick rundown of his skills (pulling, shoving, explosion and cushion). That was all they had time to do before the countdown ended.

A hidden hatch on the floor of the arena revealed itself, and from there came a dozen flying saucer shaped robots carrying wooden crates. The instructions on the sign of the arena had been "Destroy the crates." so it wasn't hard to see what they had to do.

Also, the sign changed again, displaying another countdown, this one starting at one minute. It looked like they really had no time to properly strategize.

Instead, Uraraka turned to him and spoke "If I can gather them together, could you destroy them all at once?" She asked.

Izuku nodded "Yes."

She then turned back to the robots and crouched, touching the floor with both hands open. A moment later, she had launched herself in the direction where the flying robots were slowly spreading.

Izuku pulled himself closer and watched as Uraraka landed on top of one of the crates and touched it before falling in the direction of another, almost completely horizontally. That repeated itself several times, with each crate she left behind being sucked towards a central point, while the girl herself seemed to move between them with ease.

Izuku wondered how exactly her quirk worked. He knew he had to be missing quite a lot, but from what he could sense, Uraraka's quirk was very confusing, all vectors and relative distances and all sorts of bizarre perceptions that he couldn't put together into a clear picture.

Regardless, he stopped moving when he deemed it close enough to the gathering of crates. Uraraka still had to jump through three more of them in order to move them all together. Izuku noted that the robots already in the center kept trying to spread out again, but every time Uraraka added a new one, it caused the others to be pulled back together.

Finally, it was done, and Izuku pulled himself towards the gathering of flying saucers before focusing while still moving through the air.

With a shout, he released a shock wave that destroyed all of the targets at once.

There was a beep and Izuku looked at the sign, in which the countdown had stopped at thirty seconds to spare.

"Nice!" Uraraka approached and cheered "That worked really well."

"Ah, ehmm..." With the tension gone, Izuku returned to his original state of awkwardness "Ah, you... you were really good too..." He said.

Thankfully for him, there was another beep, and the sign had changed to say "Please, leave the battlefield."

"I guess this is it for now." Uraraka said "See you later!" And she launched herself out of the arena.

Izuku sighed and pulled himself out as well. Looking around he saw that some of the other candidates were also leaving their own arenas, but not most of them. He walked towards one of the nearby arenas and looked inside.

The situation was fairly different than on his own arena. The duo wasn't facing crates, but robots that actually attacked them with a variety of non-lethal ammunition, such as rubber balls, paint balls and similar things. The candidates were only trying to defend or avoid the attacks, instead of counter-attacking, and looking at their sign, Izuku saw that they weren't allowed to fight back, which explained it.

He barely had time to reach those conclusions before the minute ended, together with that particular fight. Looking around, Izuku saw that every single battle was now over. It looked like the first round of training lasted one minute at most for every candidate.

Then he looked at the sign of the nearby arena and saw that it now said "Please, leave the battlefield.", but there was also a countdown under it, which started at fifteen seconds.

There was quite a lot of noise as the candidates realized that and scrambled to escape their respective arenas, using a ridiculous variety of quirks in the process, but as far as Izuku could see, it seemed like all of them had made it.

And then the countdown ended and the signs changed. Again, they showed two names plus instructions, but Izuku soon saw that he was headed to a different arena, with a different partner and a different objective.

The only thing that was the same as before was the thirty second countdown.

Izuku pulled himself towards his new battlefield. This time he was partnered with a boy called Akemi Hidoru. His quirk was an arm he could manipulate freely, growing and changing in a variety of ways. And the objective was going through an obstacle course created by special robots that were capable of combining together, making a three-dimensional labyrinth.

Again, there was a countdown of one minute, so both Izuku and Akemi threw themselves into the course with barely a few words exchanged. Yet, it turned out rather well, with Akemi taking the forward position by turning his hand into a pseudo tower shield, and Izuku blasting whatever traps he saw.

They finished the course with ten seconds to spare, and they were immediately expected to leave the arena. Then, just like before, there was barely any buffer time before the next pairs were announced and Izuku had to run to yet another battlefield.

It was at that time that he realized what was the true point of that training. It was a gauntlet. Heroes were sometimes expected to endure long sessions of effort with very little rest in order to help people, so this training was supposed to test that.

Reality proved that Izuku had been right. The following two hours were the hardest Izuku had ever experienced. The problem wasn't even the difficult and constant effort, though they were part of it. The real issue was the lack of opportunity to "get into the groove" so to speak.

Every time he would be partnered with another person, which was a new quirk to work with. There was also quite a variety of missions, including protecting targets, pure combat and finding hidden objects, besides the ones he had already seen.

And after one hour had passed, when Izuku was already feeling tired both physically and mentally, things got even harder. There were twists and surprises to the missions, such as carrier robots suddenly attacking, ambushes by hidden enemies in the middle of labyrinths and traps appearing during direct fights.

That meant Izuku had to be constantly wary of any surprises, even as he coped with all the other factors that made the situation challenging. The mental burden of doing all that made him start getting tired a lot faster than he would normally. Even though he had received all that physical training, it was difficult to even stand by the time the training was finally completed.

And yet, Izuku recovered his focus very fast when he saw the final change to the room. A gap in the ceiling opened up and from there appeared a huge electronic billboard, which was titled "Arena A Candidate Ranking".

There was a list of sixty names, each one with a point score. The highest one had 83 points, while the lowest one had negative 23 points. Izuku quickly found himself at the sixth position, with 71 points.

As soon as he saw it, Izuku's mind went on overdrive. What was the meaning of those points, and why did some people actually have negative scores? There was no way this wasn't relevant to the selection process.

However, worrying about that would have to wait. Izuku was feeling really hungry...


End file.
